Comedian/actor Bill Cosby performs at the Treasure Island Hotel & Casino on September 26, 2014 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Bill Cosby (Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
Comedian and actor Bill Cosby posted 10 percent of a $1 million bail in cash on Wednesday after he was arraigned on a felony sexual charge in Elkins Park, Pa. Cosby wore a spotted hoodie and walked with a cane as he nearly tripped moving up the steps to face Magisterial District Judge Elizabeth A. McHugh over a 12 year old case.
Judge McHugh ordered him to surrender his passport to the prosecutor and not to make contact with the alleged victim. Prosecutors brought charges after former Temple University employee Andrea Constand told police that Cosby, 78, drugged and violated her at his home near Philadelphia in 2004. Dozens of other women came forward with similar accusations against the once-beloved actor who played Dr. Cliff Huxtable from TV’s “The Cosby Show.”
While a previous district attorney declined to charge Cosby in 2005, prosecutors reopened the case over the summer due to the damaging testimony that was unsealed in a related civil lawsuit against Cosby. He previously admitted under oath to drugging several women with the intent to having sex with them, though he claimed to have consensual sex. Pennsylvania law gives prosecutors up to 12 years for some sex crimes, with the clock running out on this case in January.
Montgomery County First Assistant District Attorney Kevin Steele said earlier Wednesday in a press conference that Cosby was “charged with aggravated indecent assault.”
“Mr. Cosby made two sexual advances at her that were rejected,” Steele said. “Mr. Cosby urged her to take pills that he provided to her and to drink wine… He committed aggravated indecent assault against her.” She was “frozen, paralyzed, unable to move,” Steele said in announcing the charges.
In the aforementioned deposition, Cosby admitted to putting his hands down Constand’s pants that night and fondling her, but claimed to have taken her silence as consent. Constand maintains she was semi-conscious after he gave her pills he said would relax her.
A previous district attorney declined to charge Cosby in 2005.
Cosby recently filed a lawsuit alleging seven of the woman who accused him of sexual assault engaged in “nothing more than an opportunistic attempt to extract financial gain from him.” The comedian is seeking an unspecified amount in monetary damages and claimed the women inflicted emotional distress. As a result of the revelations, Boston University announced last month that it was rescinding an honorary degree they awarded to the entertainer in May 2014.
“This is the charge that we have the ability to go forward [with] under that statute of limitations,” Steele said of the aggravated indecent assault charge. “There are other alleged victims, and we are examining evidence in that. The charge that we are [announcing] here today involves one victim.”
A request for comment was not returned Wednesday, but the allegations that have long plagued the comedian are now taking a serious toll. On November 19, NBC became the second outlet following Netflix to cancel projects with Bill Cosby, which came only one day after famous model and well-known TV host Janice Dickinson told “Entertainment Tonight” that she was sexually assaulted by the comic in 1982.
A poll taken in the wake of the cancelations and rash of new allegations found that—even though nearly half of Americans said they think it’s likely the rape allegations against comedian Bill Cosby were true—networks shouldn’t have cancelled his shows until he was found guilty of an actual crime. But now, according to the most recent survey conducted by Rasmussen Reports, just 21% of American adults now have a favorable view of Bill Cosby.
